11. Postwar America

11.1 Cold War Aims
The Cold war was the most important political issue of the early postwar period, it grew out of long standing disagreements between the Soviet Union and the US.
In 1918 American troops participated in the Allied intervention in Russia on behalf of anti-Bolshevik forces. American diplomatic recognition of the Bolshevik regime did not come until 1933 and at the war´s end, antagonisms surfaced again.
The United States hoped to share with other countries its conception of liberty, equality and democracy. The Cold War developed as differences about the shape of the postwar world created suspicion and distrust between the United States and the Soviet Union.

11.2 The Postwar economy 1945 - 1960
As the Cold War unfolded in the decade and a half after World War II, the United States experienced phenomenal economic growth, the war brought the return of prosperity. The growth had different sources
- the automobile industry was partially responsible, as the number of automobiles produced annually quadrupled between 1946 and 1955
- after 1945 the major corporations in America grew even larger
- there had been earlier waves of mergers in the 1890s and in the 1920s; in the 1950s another wave occurred.

New conglomerates - firms with holdings in a variety of industries -led the way such as International Telephone and Telegraph, Continental Baking, etc, and smaller franchise operations like McDonald´s fast - food restaurants provided still another pattern. Workers found their own lives changing as industrial America changed, farmers, on the other hand, faced tough times - farming became a big business, that is why more and more farmers left the land. As suburbs grew, businesses moved into the new areas, large shopping centers containing a great variety of stores changed consumer patterns, and also television, developed in the 1930s, had a powerful impact on social and economic patterns. In 1946 the country had fewer than 17.000 television sets.

11.3 The Fair Deal:
The Fair Deal was the name given to Harry Truman´s domestic program
- building on Roosvelt´s New Deal, Truman believed that the federal government should guarantee economic opportunity and social stability.
Truman´s first priority in the immediate postwar period was to make the transition to a peacetime economy. The G.I.Bill, passed before the end of the war, helped ease servicemen back into civilian life by providing such benefits as guaranteed loans for home - buying and financial aid for industrial training and university education. Truman also provided a broader agenda for action, he fought with the Congress as it cut spending and reduced taxes. After a vigorous campaign, Truman scored one of the great upsets in American politics, defeating the Republican nominee, Thomas Dewey, governor of New York. When Truman finally left office in 1953, his Fair Deal was a great, but a mixed success.